Everything looked perfect on Instagram

John Scafiddi Jr spent a year inside. He smoked weed, watched shows, told everyone he was fine, and quietly hoped he would not wake up. Nothing had been taken from him in the way it gets taken in most of these conversations. That is what makes his story worth telling.

This is the quieter fight: depression, isolation, and comparison against a phone that makes everyone else look like they are winning. He grew up Italian in Brooklyn, where crying was not on the menu, and he talks about what bottling it up for twenty years actually costs.

He admits he bullshitted his way through therapy the first time and is ready to do it properly now. He runs the clothing brand At War, built on the idea that everyone is at war with something.